NASDAQ’s Corporate Solutions business has joined forces with data and analytics platform Visible Alpha to offer IR Insight clients access to sell-side sentiment.
The new addition to NASDAQ’s IR platform will begin with a limited beta release, covering US companies. Scott Rosen, Visible Alpha’s CEO, says the firm is expanding its reach, however.
A press release issued by NASDAQ states: ‘Visible Alpha works with the world’s leading investment banks and research providers to deliver individual analyst and consensus forecasts across all aspects of corporate performance, including full P&L, balance sheet and cash flow statements as well as segmented financial forecasts, product-level sales and pricing projections, and company and industry-specific operational metrics and assumptions.’
Rosen names these ‘leading investment banks and research providers’ as Bank of America Merrill Lynch, Citi, Jefferies, Morgan Stanley and UBS, with more set to be added in coming weeks. He also extends an invitation to ‘any bank or independent research provider that does deep fundamental analysis’ to join the platform.
Brian Reynolds, vice president of corporate solutions at NASDAQ, says that while many IROs already collect analyst models directly ‘to build up a more granular view of sell-side sentiment and how investors may be viewing them’, the Visible Alpha partnership will automate this, offering the ‘same level of depth in a much more efficient and timely manner.’
‘Corporate officers will have access to all the driving assumptions and forecasts of the analysts who follow them, on a directly comparable basis, in real time,’ adds Rosen. ‘Depending on the firm, this could include unit product sales, margin expectations, divisional revenues and expense forecasts, regional breakdowns, key operational metrics and comprehensive estimates for all three financial statements on both a GAAP and operating basis.’
The service further allows IROs to follow how ‘differences in analyst views on individual issues affect their high-level forecasts and, ultimately, investor valuations,’ according to Rosen. He adds that Visible Alpha’s estimates are ‘corrected for accounting and presentation differences’, allowing the firm to ‘provide a perspective on investment controversies that even the analysts involved may not fully appreciate.’
